Two Nerdy Movies Lose Their Directors

Over the past few months, we have been hearing some news and rumors about two big budget movie adaptations of two pretty beloved (one more so than the other) properties: Akira, the 1988 cult favorite (it was based off a manga) about biker gangs, espers and screaming (KANEDA!!!) and Uncharted, the PS3 exclusive franchise that launched Nolan North to his current level of video game awesomeness. But now, both of these projects are directorless.

Albert Hughes, co-director of From Hell and The Book of Eli, was supposed to direct the Akira movie and David O Russell, director of I Heart Huckabees and The Fighter, was attached to the Uncharted movie. Hughes left Akira because of creative differences. Russell, since getting all the Oscar praise for The Fighter, has a lot of other projects going on and cannot work on this one.

But that doesn’t mean these movies are dead. Both Warner Bros. and Columbia Pictures are still really interested in producing both movies.

Warner Bros. is currently looking for a new director and have been giving out scripts for people they hope to cast. According to Deadline, scripts for the role of Tetsuo have been given to Andrew Garfield (new Spider-Man), Robert Pattinson (BANE OF MY FUCKING EXISTENCE) and James McAvoy (Wesley Gibson from Wanted and Professor X from X-Men: First Class). Scripts for Kaneda were given to Garrett Hedlund (Sam Flynn from Tron: Legacy), Michael Fassbender (Archie Hicox from Inglourious Basterds and Magneto from X-Men: First Class), Justin Timberlake (of Justin Timberlake fame) and Chris Pine (James T. Kirk from Star Trek (2009)). Personally, I would like to see Chris Pine and James McAvoy….. Not really sure why, though.

The cast for the Uncharted movie was supposed to be Mark Wahlberg as Nathan Drake, Robert De Niro as Francis Drake and Joe Pesci as Nathan’s uncle. However (if one of the many podcasts I listen is correct), all these people have dropped out along with Russell. Hopefully this is true because it means that Nathan Fillion could have an actual shot at the role this time. No news on a possible replacement for Russell, but Columbia is currently looking for a new screenwriter to work on the first draft by Thomas Dean Donnelly and Joshua Oppenheimer (no clue who either of these guys are). Oh, I got this stuff from Deadline, too.